In July 2011, I was invited to train as a Peace Corps Volunteer in South Africa, focusing on HIV/AIDS Outreach. This is what will hopefully become my valiant attempt at documenting my experiences in the days leading up to, including, and following my service.

Wednesday, September 26, 2012

Hi All!

Sorry for the obscene lack of postage on my part. I'd like to say that I've been to busy to keep up with my own blog, but unfortunately I think laziness has been a root cause. I'll try my best to make up for it starting now.

Here is a piece I wrote about one day after my last entry, and details one of the most memorable days I've had at site so far. So here we go!

:::

I’m writing to celebrate what may have been a milestone day
between myself and my family that occurred a few days ago.I arrived back in Mohlarekoma after
over one month away from site visiting Machipe, at IST, then parusing the Wild
Coast in a lunch box on wheels.Sorry “Joan of Arc”, you served us all well but you were just so
tiny!I walked to the office on
Wednesday morning only to find the gate locked; silly me for going to work on
Madiba’s birthday! Thankful that I at least was provided with the opportunity
to strech my legs, I strolled the 45 minutes back home and conceded myself to
the task of laundry, cleaning/de-roaching my room, and hitting up the
pensioners market that materializes every month in front of my house.I was able to buy a sack of gorgeous
avocados, onions apples, bananas and a mammoth tub of atchar for less than
$10.00. Yehaw!

But I stray from my point. I woke up yesterday at 6am and went for a jog, deciding by
the end of my loop to try for work again.As I walked through the village to my usual trail across the fields that
takes you to the tar road, I ran into a coworker headed to the clinic who
informed me that once again, there was nobody at the office. Go figure.
Dimakatso, another caregiver, would be in later, she informed me, but as I had
no business of particular urgency with her, I decided to go home and see if I
couldn’t spend some time with my host family.As it turns out, that day in particular was the day in which
they would begin to de-kernel the hundreds if not thousands of corncobs that
had been baking in the sun soaked courtyard in front of my hut for over one
month.

My family has a tendency to laugh every time I offer to help
them out with household chores, and today was not by any means an
exception.Long story short, and
after I’d finished typing up the proposal for our community garden project, I
sat down with the gogo who always does my family’s groundwork (and who’s name I
admittedly cannot remember) and let her show me how to smack the kernels out of
their cobs with a big iron pole.

With kernels flying in every direction we sat together on the ground
laughing at our “workout” until many of the cobs were mostly bare, the maroon
honeycomb of the interior striking against the golden armor of the kernels.At this point, gogo shoved a medium
sized rock in my direction and showed me on her own crumbling cinder block how
to grind the cob so as to rid it of any stragglers.

What I had approached initially as an opportune cultural
learning experience was suddenly transformed into a daylong bonding
affair.The mindless work outside
in the sun was both soothing and invigorating.Before I knew it, four hours had passed and we were called
inside for lunch. The usual
protocol thus far between my family and I is that we eat separately (which I
personally dislike but am shy to approach them about) unless the meal is
earned.Needless to say today we
were definitely earning it! To the table I contributed my bucket of atchar and
we all sat around the table (my gogo, my new friend/mentor, myself, and another
gogo from down the road who had joined us outside some time earlier).

The moment that stuck with me the most as we said thank you
and left the kitchen to continue our work outside was the look in my gogo’s
eyes. Usually, she’ll stare at me with what I can only describe as a distant
perplexity, as if she’s not entirely sure what I’m about or who I am despite
our many conversations and my attempts to make myself present within the
household. That afternoon, her eyes lit up when she looked at me and I could
sense something resembling a mixture of gratitude and relief passing between
the two of us.It was as if it
took this gesture of mine;, devoting a day to the tasks of a traditional Sotho
woman, for her to judge my true character and not find me wanting.I doubt that she realized my
recognition of that moment, or honestly, if it was even a moment for her at
all.Whatever it was, it resounded
with me on a level that I cannot possibly explain.

We spent the remaining daylight happily chatting and working
in the sun, and though I was covered in dust and my hands bleeding by the end
(“they will get stronger!” gogo reassured me) there was no place on Earth I
would have rather been.